The Restorers

The poems in this, W. S. Di Piero's fifth collection of poetry, are animated by an ancient vision of the human state as existing somewhere between the divine and the bestial; tense with the compulsion toward formal order and the wild yearning after chaos, these are tough poems, gritty and relentless; they indulge neither the reader nor the poet. Their austere lyricism expresses Di Piero's desire for transcendent meaning, and their unflinching attention to natural and cultural history reflects an equally strong instinct for the earthbound.

Acknowledgments One The Early Part of the Day The Faery Child The Museum of Natural History Adam's Garden The Murphy Bed Starlings Poem Emmaus Two American Speeches The Next Room Anna at Eighteen Poem Augustine on the Beach The Two Old Ladies of September Saint Francis of Assisi Two The Restorers The Speech in the Middle of the Night Augustine in His Garden The Hotel Room Mirror The Hermit Thrush An Unwritten Letter to My Daughter In Calabria All Saints The Sicilian Vespers Gethsemane Poem Near Damascus Dreaming the Pacific Old Gold The Caverns The Original Rhinestone Cowboy Three Poems After the Sacrifice Frankie's Birthday Party

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